smile 'cause i'm walking your lifeline
by Johanna Night
Summary: Her nails across your back and you pretend it's her/ Thalia's cries in your ear and you call out Annabeth into hers/ pull her to your warmth but she knows even better than you do that your broken apologies are not to the one in the bed but to the one in the skies. To the girl who got away. AU/AH


"_I'm sorry, Percy. It was the only way."_

and so she's gone.

* * *

_So won't you_

_Open your eyes say you're_

_Just fine_

_The way that you did back then all the time_

_So won't you_

_Smile cause I'm walking your_

_Lifeline_

_And tell me what's wrong so I can_

_Change your mind_

_Smile cause I'm walking your _

_Lifeline_

_Smile cause I'm walking your_

* * *

three years later and you still wake up reaching out, still wake up with wet cheeks and her name on your lips, dry and cracked with your gasping breaths. _Annabeth, _you think. "Annabeth," you say, like that will make her appear.

fold the clothes on the chair and do laundry obsessively because she would have done so-because if you look around her presence is smiling, even in death victorious. She closes cold hands around your heart and keeps it from beating evermore-

one more kiss

you will never know what she thought never know if she loved you never know if she wanted you-

so much you will never know and too much you will never discover. And amber liquid glimmers tauntingly so beautiful and you lose yourself. One glass of whiskey slip sliding down throat and the world _spins_

you see her sometimes in that haze, wish you could raise your hands and touch her face, stroke the hair you've _memorized_by heart the way you've memorized her last words, brush your lips to hers with your soul at the tip of your tongue, ready to give it all for her to just _livelivelive_

nothing you could do would have saved her. the fates are cruel that way.

five seconds to midnight five seconds to her and as time slips by her memory only grows sharper. now instead of her lemon scented caress you know the way sunlight casts butterfly breaths of gold into her locks instead of the way she kisses you know the way she loves, the way eyelashes thick with moisture lift and gray envelopes you.

pictures photos memories too much never enough. You want to touch _her,_her body in your arms her warmth to your heartbeat and not those photos, those beautiful moments where everything froze into one faded paper. You want to touch her so badly it hurts so badly you are a raw, bleeding nerve.

_I'm sorry, Annabeth. I'm sorry._in your dreams she doesn't accept but what hurts is that in life she will. You know she will.

you are the one who needs to forgive yourself.

* * *

dark hair, dark eyes you go through them like paper hearts. because blonde hair hurts too much because gray eyes make you cry out for her because you can run your hands down milky skin and wish it bore californian tan, wish you could find someone to make you forget but relieved she stays with you.

her eyes accusing you when you fall asleep, girl against your side suddenly unwelcome. Tomorrow she will be gone and you will be left with a ghost, left with the ghost of that beautiful blonde with hair like woven gold and the lips of an angel.

so when you reach out to touch her she's paper thin, wisps of fog already burning to nothing. She swirls around your fingertips and _no Annabeth no_but then she's gone.

In your dreams she asks you why you left her all alone, all alone and _Percy I miss you i love you why did you let me go_

but she's not like that. She's not cruel like you deserve, not biting words and harsh remarks because you had _perfection_and you let it go how could you do this to her-

No, she's soft beauty and rounded curves and the warmth of a beating heart, the way that beautiful organ _thump thump thump_fluttered under your palm. _Thump thump thump_and you can still imagine, eyes closed hands folded preserved by your love.

* * *

wake up to a heartbeat at your chest, a murmur of your name and it sounds like her, and _Annabeth_ you say knowing it's not true. And electric blue pierces you the way her eyes used to but now will only do so in your dreams.

too blue not dark enough not _gray-_

nothing's right. She's not right. She's not _Annabeth she's not Annabeth she's not Annabeth_ and everything fucking hurts and the dark hair suddenly hurts your eyes, the smattering of freckles across Thalia's cheekbones suddenly not welcoming as they were last night because _her_ skin was pristine. _Getoutgetoutgetou_t-

She leaves. You want to call her back but she turns once, a sad smile that tells you what you don't need her to say out loud, that last night was a meeting of your bodies but a distancing of your minds, that though she was the one you held and made love to and whispered sweet nothings to she is not the one you want. and you are not who she wishes for and neither of you are happy.

but Thalia comes back

you tell yourself it's for the release but really it's for the memories. Her nails across your back and you pretend it's _her_, Thalia's cries in your ear and you call out _Annabeth_ into hers. pull her to your warmth but she knows even better than you do that your broken apologies are not to the one in the bed but to the one in the skies. To the girl who got away.

* * *

open your eyes to see _Annabeth_ standing there-naked and bared to the world but achingly lovely and it's not erotic at all, just longing, her silhouette against the wall and her marks on your soul.

her ghost doesn't stay to haunt you. you forget to let her go.

* * *

_So won't you_

_Open your eyes say you're_

_Just fine_

_The way that you did back then all the time_

_So won't you_

_Smile cause I'm walking your_

_Lifeline_

_And tell me what's wrong so I can_

_Change your mind_

_Smile cause I'm walking your_

_Lifeline_

_Smile cause I'm walking your_

* * *

**A/N: I do not own PJO. Thanks for reading, and please review!**

**~Johanna**


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